Tuesday, April 19, 2011

Greek Yogurt + Homemade Granola

One of the advantages of breastfeeding is that you get to eat all of the time and not gain any weight. In fact, most of my breastfeeding friends and I have noticed that you actually lose MORE weight than you gained during pregnancy.

To curb some of my constant hunger, I have found that eating Greek yogurt plus homemade granola has been helpful. I have been doing this for about a month now and have really noticed that I will stay full more than 15 minutes. This is an easy snack for work either mid-morning or mid-afternoon for me.

I buy a giant container of Greek yogurt. The super sized Fage yogurt from Costco or the Trader Joe's brand Greek yogurt are favorites. I also am partial to any brand's honey & vanilla variety. Or how about the pomegranite Chobani?! I have not yet gotten adventurous and tried homemade yogurt a la Tara & Dan, but it's on my to-do list. I make one batch of the following granola on Sunday afternoon and it lasts me a week.

Combine dry ingredients (sans fruit) in large bowl & mix well. Heat oil, honey & maple syrup in a saucepan over low heat till hot. Pour into dry ingredients and stir till well blended. Spread out on large cookie sheet and bake in 325-degree preheated oven for 15 minutes, stirring every 5 minutes, until nice and golden. Remove from oven & stir in dried fruit. Store in air tight container

**I am allergic to both walnuts and almonds so I have never made this as written. I usally use a a combo of cashews, peanuts and/or pecans for the nuts. I have made it with regular raisins, golden raisins and craisins (or a combo of those three) and love each version.

Granola is fun because you can totally experiment with the fruit/nut combos!